


Improvements

by Fyre



Series: The Protector of Wakanda [3]
Category: Black Panther (2018), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Gen, Missing Scene, Siblings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-04
Updated: 2019-04-04
Packaged: 2020-01-04 21:46:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18352334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fyre/pseuds/Fyre
Summary: Sometimes, T'Challa gives his sister new toys to play with.





	Improvements

**Author's Note:**

> I started writing this the night I saw Black Panther. Took me a while to finish it :)

Music was pulsing up from the lab.

With a flick of his fingers, T’Challa dismissed the attendant members of the Dora Milaj, then descended the ramp into his sister’s domain. 

It came as no surprise to him that all the pieces of machinery they had taken from their guests had been disassembled into their component parts. Three-dimensional projections of each object hung above the work benches, revolving slowly, first on the horizontal axis, then switching to the vertical.

“You have been busy,” he observed.

Shuri glanced over her shoulder at him. “You could sound more impressed.”

He tilted his hand from side-to-side. “I don’t know. All I have seen so far is that you know how to break expensive foreign machines into pieces.”

She snorted, swinging her chair around. “I thought that was your job, oh King.”

He gave her a look, which only made her grin at him. “Impress me, then.”

She leapt up and he knew she had been waiting for the chance to do so. “It was much easier than I expected,” she admitted, leading him over to one of the benches. “The technology is very primitive, but I am not surprised.” She made a face. “They don’t care how it harms the people who they use it on.”

The projection of Barnes’s ruined arm rotated in front of them. T’Challa had not been present during the removal, but he had no doubt that Shuri had supervised. 

“Advanced for its time,” he observed. “The Winter Soldier has been active for many years.”

Shuri grudgingly nodded. “But needlessly cruel.” She spun the projection around, revealing the connectors and the trailing web of hair-thin wires. “They made it function like a real arm by wiring it into his body to give him some level of control of it.” 

T’Challa touched the mesh of wires. “All of these?”

She nodded. “Like I said: needlessly cruel. He should rest more easily without it.”

T’Challa glanced down at the pieces spread out on the work bench. He picked up one of them, hefting it in his hand. “Heavier than it looks too.” 

“They wanted something that would not break easily.” She wrinkled her nose. “The plating is strong, but the technique they used made it much denser than it needed to be. It will take some time before he will regain his balance.”

T’Challa recalled the deadly grace of the Winter Soldier. He moved like a predator without any visible effort. If that was how he moved when he was weighed down, he would be a formidable adversary without that burden. He tossed the piece of the detached limb to his sister. “I think we can do better.”

She laughed, setting the piece back down. “We? What is this ‘we’?”

He held up his hands. “Of course, of course, I mean you. You can do better.”

She stuck her chin out with a smirk. “Better than crude machines built during the cold war? What do you take me for?” She touched one of the consoles and a new projection lit up: a digital sketch of a more streamlined version of Barnes’s metal arm. “He may not wish to use them, but I’m working on several designs so he has the choice when he wakes.”

T’Challa spun the sketch with a fingertip. It was made up of a similar design of plates and panels, but the joints looked more flexible. The tapering of the fingertips could almost have been human. He could feel Shuri watching him and nodded grudgingly. “Not bad for something thrown together in a few hours.”

She punched him fondly on the arm. “You know you could not do better.” She reached up and turned the projection around. “The connection is the problem.” She spread her fingers, opening out the mechanism. “They saw nothing wrong with wiring him like a robot, but I would prefer to make something functional and comfortable.”

Always thinking ahead, his little sister.

“Do you have any ideas?”

She gave him that familiar look. “What do you think?”

He chuckled. “One day, you might surprise me.”

Shuri laughed. “One day,” she agreed, “but not today.” She studied the arm that was still gently spinning above her work bench. “It is more complicated than I expected. The people who gave him his arm did a lot of damage when they fitted it. I left the doctors working on him while he sleeps. They are hopeful that they may be able to undo some of the damage and heal some of the scar tissue. At least he should not be in pain anymore.”

“A small mercy after all he has suffered,” T’Challa murmured. 

His sister knocked his elbow with her own. “Chased across the rooftops of Berlin by a strange man dressed as a panther…”

“Shuri…”

She grinned. “Poor little white boy didn’t know what hit him.”

Long experience had taught him that chastisement never worked, especially when she was grinning at him like that. “What about the collar?” he asked, turning his attention to the restraint that had been placed on Maximoff.

Shuri made a face. I don’t think anyone would care if I threw it in a furnace and melted it down,” she admitted. “It was the Americans that made her wear it?”

“I suppose,” he said with a sigh, “they considered it the equivalent of putting a lock on a door.” He sifted through the pieces with one finger. “They fear her.”

Shuri snorted. “Of course they do. They don’t understand her and she is more powerful than them.” She shook her head and sighed dramatically. “Men can be so foolish.” She met his stern glare without an ounce of remorse

“She fears herself also,” he pointed out. “What she might be capable of.”

Shuri nodded, her expression sobering. “Like Sergeant Barnes - they both fear what they might do.” She looked at the collar and drummed her fingertips on the edge of the work bench. “I could try to adapt the technology from the collar: the power-dampeners could be modified into something she could choose to wear if she felt uncomfortable. Gloves that she can removed, perhaps.”

“That is something you would have to discuss with her.” T’Challa glanced at her. “You have told me often enough that I don’t know how to accessorise.” 

Shuri grinned at him. “I’m glad you remember your lessons.” She glanced down at the table again. “You have spoken to her?”

“Briefly, yes.”

“What is she like?” She was watching her fingertip spin a curl of metal, a furrow between her brows.

Sometimes, he thought, it was easy to forget how young Shuri was. She would never admit to being nervous, but she had seen footage of Wanda Maximoff long before his own encounter with the Avengers. Science was something solid and real, but magic - something so ephemeral and powerful - was beyond her experience. 

He considered before answering. “Sad.”

His sister raised her eyes to him. “Sad?”

He nodded. “She is not one to be afraid of.

“Ha! Afraid!” Shuri swatted his arm, though her smile was more forced than usual. “Do I seem afraid to you?” 

T’Challa only raised his eyebrows.

Shuri glowered at him, chewing on her lip. “She contained the force of a missile!” She burst out. “Do you understand how much power she must have to contain the energy released by a blast like that? I’ve never seen _anything_ living do something like that!”

He couldn’t stop his lips from twitching. “Something beyond your science?”

She narrowed her eyes at him and gave him a pointed kick in the shin. 

“I am your king,” he grumbled fondly. 

“You insulted my science in my lab.” She straightened up from the workbench, her jaw set with determination. “I want to talk to her.”

He smiled. Always his stubborn, brave little sister. “She will be glad to meet you.” Shuri beamed at him. “And then you will start talking and she will change her mind.”

“Hey!”

He laughed, dodging another kick.

**Author's Note:**

> Alas, shorter chapter this time around, because otherwise I would never have finished it. The muse is difficult lately.


End file.
